Sarko And Romney: Trapped By Their Base?

It's hard not to see parallels as they both seek to pander to the base and to pivot back to the center. Sarko, of course, has to hustle a little more quickly to pull it off:

French radio has already made the interesting point that Sarkozy had pursued a strategy of turning to the hard right in the final stages of the campaign, with a view to moving to the centre for the second round. This is a classic recipe for winning the two-round election, but it hasn’t been missed that it was Sarko’s adviser Patrick Buisson who suggested it, and he’s the former editor of the extreme right’s favourite magazine, Minute, one of many old extreme-rightists on Sarkozy’s staff. The problem is that he still needs to get the centre on board, but with 20% of the electorate to his right, he needs to cover that flank as well, which may well be impossible.